PAIN AND SUFFERING: Pain vs Evil
by Jared Downs
Summary: Max Payne's final battle with Horne. Please R/R.


PAIN AND SUFFERING: Pain vs. Evil

I ran after her up the metal staircase, a biretta in each hand and a sniper rifle on my back. Horne was on the run. She had caused all the pain and a bullet was the only way to stop it.

She made it to the top of the staircase then turned around to stare down at me with her evil eyes. She pulled an Uzi out of her coat and I dove down on my stomach. She fired and looked to see if she had hit me, her predator coming for the kill. I took two shots at her with one of my birettas. I missed. I could've ended the pain right there but I missed. I expected her to fire again, taking care of me once and for all, but she didn't. She pulled something else out of her coat quickly. It was a grenade. She pulled the pin, threw, and ran.

I heard her cold heartless voice say "That's for you." as it came through the air at me. It landed several steps behind me. I got to my feet as fast as I could and ran like the devil himself was after me. The sound of the explosion filled the air. I didn't fall. I had not failed yet.

I ran out the door onto the roof of the hag's building. The snow storm was unleashing all it's fury down on the battle. It was even causing the heavy radio tower that crowned the building to lean. Horne was going through a gate that led to another section of the rooftop. I raised my guns up to fire but the sound of a loud clang cut the wind and I turned around thinking one of Horne's guards had followed me and was firing. Nobody was there.

I noticed one of four wires holding the tower in place had snapped, which explained the clang noise.

I turned around to see that the gate was closed. I ran to it to find it locked and I could not see Horne. There had to be another way to the other side of the roof. It was fate, I had not been put through all this hell to fail at the last New York minute.

I ran past the door I had come from and around a corner to find an electric glass door. I peered through the glass, through a room with an elevator and through another glass door to see Horne. Her unmarked chopper was landing near her.

The doors opened for me and I ran through the room to find that the other door would not open. I tried shooting through the glass but it was bullet proof, holding off my revenge.

She boarded the chopper and I heard a voice from an intercom inside the chopper. "We'll lift off as soon as the wind dies down."

There was no hope for me. I went back out into the storm and another clang filled the air. The radio tower was leaning even more...leaning over the chopper.

The voice from the chopper spoke again. "No sign of wind dying down soon. Attempting to take off in two minutes."

I had no time to let the wind snap the remaining two wires. I looked at the corner of the rooftop to see an unsnapped wire. It was time to send Horne where she belonged: hell.

I ran over to it and looked down at the hinge holding it. It was barely hanging there. I shot it with my biretta and the wire went flying past me, nearly hitting my face.

One left.

I turned around and saw it. It was out of my reach, I couldn't get to it. It seemed a hundred miles away to me.

I had to try. I put my birettas in my jacket and drew my sniper rifle. I couldn't see the hinge so I would have to make the best guess of where to shoot. Even if I could see it it'd still be one hell of a hard shot to get.

I had twelve shots. Twelve chances of winning this war against the Hag. I looked through my scope and shot once. Miss.

"Lift off in one minute." the pilot said.

A concentrated and shot again. Miss.

I tried several more times. All misses.

I was down to six shots. I shot again only to miss.

I kept shooting and missing, the wire was mocking me.

"Lift off in thirty seconds."

I was down to two shots when the glass doors opened and a guard holding a grenade launcher came out onto the roof. He'd come up on the elevator.

He aimed at me and I dove for my life. The explosion went off but was muted by the wind and could barely be heard. The winds of hell were screaming that bad now.

I was around the corner, out of his view. I put the rifle back on my back and took out my birettas. I went around the corner and shot him in the chest three times and he fell to the ground wearing a red tuxedo.

I got my sniper rifle out and shot again...and missed.

I aimed and took my last shot...Then I heard the most beautiful noise I've heard since my wife's voice. Clang! It could barely be heard but the wire had snapped.

The tower leaned more than it had before but it was not falling over.

"Lift off in ten seconds."

Right then I knew I had failed.

"Lift off in 5, 4-"

Or had I? I rushed over to the guard's corpse and picked up the grenade launcher.

"-1." I fired a shot into the radio tower. It began to fall.

The helicopter started to rise up but came crashing back to the ground. I ran back to the room with the elevator to see the effects of my handy work.

The whole roof of the chopper was smashed in. I noticed that the edge of the concrete landing pad was starting to crack. It split away from the roof and the helicopter began to fall along with the landing pad.

A few moments went by as it fell a hundred stories then there was the sound of an explosion.

The glass doors that had not opened before did. Someone had turned every lock in the building off. Probably a SWAT team on there way to claim there prize.

I walked over to the edge of the roof and peered down at Horne's chopper. It was now a fiery mess and the landing pad was on top of it.

They were all dead. The final gunshot had been an exclamation mark to every that had led up to this point. I released my finger from the trigger...and it was over.

  
  
  
  
  
  



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